DemonWars Saga Volume 1 (18 page)

"Not this time!" he yelled loudly, and there was no return laughter from the brush, no sound at all. "Ne leque towithel!" he repeated in elvish.

Elbryan slowly passed the last tree, home free, so he thought.

Something zipped by him, just under his chin. He heard a thud at the side and turned to see one of those tiny elvish. arrows half buried in a tree. A second bolt whistled behind him, turning him with a start, and only when Elbryan noticed the silvery filament trailing this arrow did he understand what was happening.

There came a third and a fourth, all dangerously close.

"Not fair!" the boy yelled, trying to move — and discovering that the sticky strands were already grabbing at him. He looked at the brush helplessly, at the steaming stew, just a few strides away.

More arrows whistled past, each trailing a strand, each tightening the web about Elbryan, holding him from his meal.

"Not fair!" he yelled repeatedly, tearing at the strands. He managed to pull a few down — a couple of arrows came out of the tree, other strands pulled free of the arrow fletchings — but that helped only a little, as the now loose strands clung to the boy's clothing, entangling him even more.

Another arrow came by and slashed across Elbryan's forearm as he struggled. His protest came out as a snarl, words stolen by the stinging pain, and he stopped his thrashing and clutched at his arm.

"Cowards!" he yelled in total frustration. "Goblinkin! Only a coward would shoot from the boughs. Only a coward of goblin heritage would attack someone who has no weapons with which to strike back!"

The next arrow razored painfully across the back of his neck, drawing a line of bright blood.

"Enough!" came a stern voice from the brush, a voice that Elbryan recognized — and was certainly glad to hear.

Protests, laughter, taunts all came back in reply from many different places.

"Enough, Tuntun!" Belli'mar Juraviel demanded again; and the elf came forth from the brush, moving to young Elbryan. Tuntun, bow in hand, came out from across the way and moved quickly to follow on Juraviel's heels.

"Calm, my friend," Juraviel prompted poor Elbryan, the boy thrashing about and only entangling himself even more. "The strands will not let go until Tuntun commands them." Juraviel turned and glared at the female then, and she sighed resignedly and muttered something under her breath.

Almost immediately, the strands began to fall from Elbryan, except for those still tight in the line from the tree to the brush where Tuntun had tied them off, and those which the young man had inadvertently twisted and turned about his limbs.. Finally, with Juraviel's help, Elbryan got. free, and he immediately stormed up to Tuntun, his green eyes flaring dangerously.

The elf looked up at him calmly, smiling, perfectly relaxed.

"I earned that meal!" the boy stormed.

"So go and eat it," Tuntun replied, and snickers came at Elbryan from every bush. "You. needn't worry that it will burn your tongue."

"Elbryan," Juraviel warned when he saw the boy ball his fist at his side.

Tuntun held up a hand to her elvish companion, silently bidding Juraviel to let her take care of this situation. Juraviel knew what was coming, and though he did not like it, for he thought it too soon in the boy's training, he did on some levels agree that the lesson might be necessary.

"You want so badly to strike me." Tuntun tittered.

Elbryan fumed but couldn't, in good conscience, punch this diminutive creature, half his weight, if that, and a girl besides!

Tuntun's bow came up, faster than Elbryan could follow, and the elf let fly an arrow, down the path. It struck the bowl of stew, overturning it and making a mess of the meal. "You'll get nothing more this day," Tuntun said sternly.

The knuckles on both of Elbryan's hands were white by this point, and the muscles along his jaw strained taut. He started to turn away, thinking that he had to hold his control, had to let all the insults pass, but before he got halfway around, Tuntun slapped her bow across the back of his head.

Elbryan let fly a wide-arcing left hook as he spun back toward the elf. He missed miserably, Tuntun ducking low under the predictable blow, and kicking him twice in rapid succession, once on the inside of each knee.

Elbryan stumbled and squared himself; Tuntun tossed her bow aside, held up both her empty hands, and motioned for Elbryan to come on.

The boy paused. The forest was silent, totally silent, about him, and Juraviel made not a move nor any indication of how Elbryan should proceed.

It was his choice to make, he realized, and so he crouched low; hands out wide, feeling his balance on the balls of his feet. He waited, and waited some more, until Tuntun relaxed, and then he sprang like a hunting cat.

He caught the air, nothing more, and didn't even realize that the elf was not in front of him until he heard wings fluttering behind him and felt a series of sharp punches on the back of his head.

He wheeled, but Tuntun turned with him, staying behind him and punching out a veritable drum roll on his upper back. Furious, Elbryan finally launched himself sideways, putting some ground between him and his elusive opponent.

"Blood of Mather!" Tuntun said sarcastically. "He fights as any lumbering human might!"

Juraviel wanted to respond that Mather had fought the exact same way in the first years of his training, but he let it pass. Let Tuntun have her fun this day, the elf decided; that would make his victory all the sweeter when Elbryan finally proved himself.

On cue, Elbryan came back in, measuring his steps this time, not taking his eyes off the dancing elf. Tuntun was on the ground again, swaying slowly, hands waving before her.

Elbryan saw an opening and let fly a combination left jab, step, and right cross. He meant to retract the left, which missed, that he could roll his shoulders and put some weight behind the right. He meant to do a lot of things, to follow the combination with a shoulder tackle or another quick one-two if the opportunity presented itself. He found, however, that as soon as his left arm extended, his fist flying so tantalizing near Tuntun's swaying head, that his moment of control had passed.

Tuntun turned in accord with the punch, her head fading back across to Elbryan's right, her right hand catching the boy's wrist and pushing outward, her left hand coming back in and catching the outside of his elbow, driving in.

As Elbryan's arm locked, and before he could even step in and begin the cross, Tuntun turned her right wrist over and down.

Elbryan had no choice but to follow, scampering out to the left a step before tumbling hard to the ground, crashing into one nearby bush. To his credit, he didn't fight the roll or even try to break his fall. He went right over and came back out low, scrambling for Tuntun's legs.

The elf straightened and stiffened, and leaned forward over the lunging boy's head and shoulders.

Tuntun's strength surprised Elbryan, for he could not break the elf's position, and then he was surprised even more as Tuntun locked her hands together and brought them down hard onto the tender area just below Elbryan's right shoulder blade.

The boy felt the strength leave that side of his body. He staggered down again, was barely even conscious that his hold on the elf was broken. He noted the elf's spring, heard the wings fluttering. He went up fast to his knees, realizing that he was vulnerable. He heard a snicker, then felt the explosion as Tuntun, half turning and landing easily on one foot right between the boy's ankles, let fly a kick with the other, up between Elbryan's thighs to catch him right in the groin.

The boy went down hard, clutching and groaning, feeling suddenly weak and nauseous.

"Tuntun!" he heard Juraviel protest, and it seemed to him as if the elf's voice had come from far away.

"He fights like a human," Tuntun answered indignantly.

"He is a human!" Juraviel reminded.

"All the more reason to kick him hard." The laughter from the forest was painful to Elbryan, at least as much as his wounded groin. He remained on the ground for a very long time, eyes closed, curled in a fetal position.

Finally, he opened his eyes and rolled to find Juraviel alone standing near him. The elf offered a hand, but Elbryan stubbornly refused, struggling shakily to his feet.

"Suffer the barbs, my young friend," Juraviel offered. "They are not without merit."

"Lick a bloody cap," Elbryan cursed, a common insult among humans, but one referring to powries. Elbryan hardly knew what a "bloody cap" was, and so the meaning of his own curse was lost on him.

It wasn't lost on Juraviel, though, for the elf had battled the fierce, evil powries many times over the centuries. Recognizing the boy's ultimate distress and embarrassment, Juraviel generously let the insult pass.

Elbryan walked a crooked path to the food and stubbornly salvaged what he could. That done, he hoisted the last basket and started back the half mile to the trough.

Juraviel followed silently, some distance behind. He wanted to make the most of Tuntun's painful lesson, but he wasn't sure that Elbryan was in any frame of mind to learn.

Titters came at Elbryan from the shadows several times as he walked. He ignored them, didn't even hear them, lost in his self pity, consumed by
frustrated rage. He felt so alone and isolated, felt as if he would have been better off had these vile elves not come and rescued him from the fomorian.

Back at the trough, Elbryan began his more difficult work. He took up one of the saturated stones and squeezed it with all his strength over the trough.

When the porous thing was light once more, the flavored bog water extracted, Elbryan tossed it near the basket and took up the next. All too soon, before he had even finished with the first basket, his forearms ached from the effort.

Juraviel walked past Elbryan to the trough and dipped his cupped hands in.

He stared at the water for a moment, eyeing its hue, then sniffed its delicate bouquet. The combination of bog water and milk-stones, as the elves called them, produced some of the sweetest juices in all of Corona. From this raw product, the elves would make their intoxicating wine, Questel ni'touel to the elves, but known to the wide world simply as "boggle." The swamplike connotation of the name was usually completely lost on the humans, who thought the term a mere reference to their state of mind after but a few sips of the potent liquid. Not that many humans had ever tasted the elixir, for the elves did not deal openly in the juice. Their contacts in the wide human world were discrete and few, but the elves did enough trading so that they could bring desired items, curiosity pieces mostly, and a sampling of songs of the few human bards who could bring them pleasure, into their valley.

"A good take today," Juraviel commented, hoping to draw the boy from his sour mood.

Elbryan grunted and did not reply. He took up another stone, held it high over the trough and squeezed with all his might, hoping to splash the juices enough to wet Juraviel.

The elf was too quick and wary for that.

Juraviel nodded at the surprising effect, though, taking note of the boy's gain in strength after just a few short weeks. He thought to leave Elbryan then, but decided to try one last time to calm the boy, to put a positive meaning on the embarrassing and painful lesson. "It is good that you have such spirit,"

Juraviel said, "and better still that you keep it under such control."

"Not so tight a rein," Elbryan replied, growling with each word. To accentuate his point, Elbryan lifted the next stone, and, instead. of holding it over the trough, hurled it into the brush nearby, an act of defiance and of finality. Even if he went and retrieved it, the liquid within the stone had been tainted and was no good.

Juraviel stared solemnly at the spot where the stone had bounced for a long moment. He tried to view things through Elbryan's eyes, tried to sympathize with the frustration, tried to remember the terrible tragedy the youngster had suffered just this past season.

It was no good. For whatever had happened, today and in the days and weeks before, this stubborn behavior could only lead to disaster. Juraviel turned on Elbryan swiftly and suddenly, wings lifting the elf into a short hop. One hand grabbed the back of Elbryan's hair, the other cupped under the boy's chin, and though Elbryan, at least as strong as the elf, got his arms up to defend, when Juraviel turned his arms, turned Elbryan's head, the boy had no chance to resist. Juraviel took full advantage, put Elbryan off balance and kept on twisting, angling the boy over the trough. Quite a bit of juice might be ruined, but Juraviel figured the loss was worth it.

He put Elbryan's head under the liquid, brought him up, sputtering, then dunked him again. The third time, he held the boy under for what seemed like minutes, and when he brought Elbryan up and subsequently let him go, the stunned boy fell to the ground, gasping desperately.

"I am your friend," Belli'mar Juraviel said sternly. "But let us both understand the situation from the proper perspective. You are n'Touel'alfar, not of the People. You have been brought into Andur'Blough Inninness to be trained in the way of the rangers. This is fact, it has begun and there can be no turning back. If you fail in this, if you do not prove yourself worthy of elven friendship, you cannot be let out into the world with the knowledge you have attained of our home and of our ways."

Even as Elbryan started to protest, horrified at the thought of becoming a prisoner, Juraviel finished grimly, "Nor can you stay."

Elbryan's thoughts shifted to the illogic of it all. He couldn't leave, and he couldn't stay. How could that be?

The boy's jaw drooped as he realized the only remaining possibility, as he considered that Tuntun would carry out his execution, if Juraviel would not, without hesitation.